Blood and Gold
by A.K. Haddock
Summary: I've maintained two states of being for as long as I can remember: cold indifference and white hot rage; blinding and soaked in layers of blood, some old, some new. When a member of my crew challenges my right as alpha, he learns the hard way why I lead and others follow. Warning: Mild gore, brief mention of dismemberment. Rated as such. One shot for now, could be something more.


I've had two states of being as long as I can remember. Cold indifference and white hot rage. Rage coated in layers of blood, some caked on, some slick and warm, fresh from the source. It's been so long that I've felt anything else, it has become hard for me to talk. All I use my voice for now is details on the next job or curt orders when we're on the road. During battle I scream and roar my throat hoarse, but there's no words there. No need to think, just lose myself in the fire and the rage and the blood. I can barely hold a conversation, even with those who I've known for weeks and months, let alone relate to them, understand their problems. But I understand discontent. So it came as no surprise as several of my men approached me where I sat next to the fire one night.

Galden led them. He was green, didn't understand how our little band of mercenaries worked yet. The way he was walking, the way he held himself, chest out and legs spread apart, chin jutting forward and up but brow furrowed. His body language screamed confrontation and perceived righteousness. But he is just a human, and I am Orismer, no matter what my tribe claimed. I knew when he approached me like this that he would not live long enough be anything but green.

"Baerd, I would have words with you."

Ah. There it is. The challenge. My blood begins to grow hot, the blood caking my rage starting to flake away as it stirs in my chest. This I know, this I can understand. Fancy words and half-truths frustrate me, make me gnash my teeth. But this. This I know. But I do not move yet. To move now would be foolish. As much as my blood screams for action, I know from experience that he needs to be allowed to speak his piece in front of the men. Needs to get it out in the open so that when I tear his head from his body his foolish words and promises of a better life to the men are destroyed in their infancy. Kill him sooner, and the men become disquieted. Question me as leader, as alpha.

"Baerd, I _will_ have words with you."

I scoff quietly to myself. So self-assured already, he does not even show me the respect a warrior of my strength deserves.

"Whatever problems you have with me and how I choose to lead. You and I will have words, but only because I allow it. Not because you deserve my time or respect."

A hush follows over the camp. It's the most I've said to any of the men in a long while. Those who have been with me the longest were sat around me, nearly as quiet as me. They've seen almost as much as me. At my words, they quietly get up and move to the other side of the fire. Leaving me alone with Galden and his pack of fools.

Galden sneers, disrespect threading his words

"Me and mine think it's time we had a little change in leadership. The jobs you find for us are low paying and ill befitting a band of our caliber. We should be taking what we want from the weak or selling our swords to the highest bidder, not tending to tiny backwater shit-holes like Karthwasten."

He pauses, confident in his gambit, before pressing on, oblivious to blinding white shining in my chest, or the red coating my eyes.

"Step down quietly, and you can remain with us. Refuse, and we shall cut you down."

I am boiling, rage clouding my mind, but I struggle for control, clawing desperately through the mire to gain some semblance of footing in my own mind. Somehow, I manage.

"We will not prey on the weak. For that you should consider yourself lucky. The men would have killed you in your sleep weeks ago."

My voice is harsh and grating. On top of that, I have not spoken a word beyond "we camp here" in 3 days, and my throat was thick with phlegm. A speck flies out and hits Galden on his stupid silk tunic. He looks down, shocked.

He snarls, anger flashing in his eyes. Good. He needs to know what a real battle is like before I rip him from this world. He draws his sword, a big, clumsy thing, to heavy even for Egra, and makes to cut my head from shoulders in one sweep. That simply won't do. Glad that he made the first move, I let what little control I had left leave me, and I lunge forward under his swinging blade, coming to my feet inside his guard. I tower over, even hunched and feral as I am now.

I look into his eyes and see the rage flee and fear flood into them. Tsk tsk, such cowards in my band? Unacceptable. I drive my first into his stomach, and he staggers, all the hot air he's been inflating himself with the past several weeks bursting out of him. I press the advantage, though I don't need to, and seize his sword arm with both my hands before wrenching it savagely, several sickly cracks accompanying my actions. Music to my ears.

He cries out, the weakling he is, and tries to wrench free of me, despite the pain. A little respect returns for him. His arms is shattered, but his desperation to get free and fight back overrule the pain. If only he hadn't challenged me, I might have forged him into a warrior to be feared one day. Grasping his arm firmly in one hand, I slam the other into his shoulder and give a mighty wrench, tearing his arm free from its socket and tearing his fore arm off entirely. The bone was nothing, and the flesh was weakened by the trauma of having the bones within pulverized. It was easy. Disappointingly easy. The harder I have to pull the harder it hurts them.

Blood pours freely from his mangled arm, his heart killing him faster than I would like. He starts to scream. I hate screams when everything else is quiet. It grates the ears for they are least expecting it. So I lunge forward, sinking my tusks into his neck just next to his Adam's apple, bite down, and tear. The screaming stops quite suddenly then.

My rage pulses, satisfied with the fresh coat of blood it has received, sated for now.

Galden falls to the ground, gurgling quietly for a few moments, and I turn and make my way back to the stump I had claimed as my own. I sit down and look at the fools who had followed Galden, a chunk of his flesh still caught on one of my tusks.

"Anyone want to join him in his quest for gold and glory?

All of them shake their heads and retreat back into the shadows were the greenhorns sleep.

Baldek works his way around the fire to me and sits down on a fallen log. We sit for a moment, silent, observing the savaged body just a few feet away. He clears his throat.

"It's been too long. I know you don't like it, but you need to let it out. We need a job, preferably one where we can kill with impunity. Mostly you, really."

I nod, agreeing. The longer I go between the battles, the harder it is to control the blood caked white in my chest.

"We make for Whiterun. The bandits are plentiful and the men will like being in a real city again. We move at first light."

As Baldek nods and moves away to tell the men, I feel my blood calm and the cold indifference that is my resting state settle back over me. Colors fade and noise fades away, and I almost wish for the rage to be back. Just so I can feel something, anything.

* * *

AN: I whipped this up in 45 minutes because I couldn't face another game of League at the moment and didn't feel like practicing my horn and it had been bouncing around in my head for a few days. If it's something you are interested in, let me know. I wrote it as a one shot, but I could be motivated to write more.


End file.
